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“Yesterday’s sprinkles gave way to real rain. You can just feel the tired old earth around me go “ahhhhhh.”
I woke up craving this. I must have needed an “ahhhh” too. This is lovely and fruity (love...”
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“SIPDOWN! I loved this when I first got it, but I did find it to be finicky – finicky, but worth it. As long as I keep the temp around 203F and the time around three minutes this is great.
Hubby...”
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“It’s been forever since I’ve had this tea. But not because I don’t love it. It’s actually the opposite – I adore this tea so much that I haven’t been able to force myself to open the new tin of...”
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“Sipdown! Had a small cup of this before tucking the rest ofth is away For cavocorax :) while I enjoy this one, it’s not my favourite of the MF teas that I’ve had the pleasure of trying.”
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From Mariage Frères

Mariage Frères’ most famous secret is this mysterious blend that takes you to distant lands and strange countries. The aroma of Chinese and Tibetan flowers and fruit lend it a uniquely velvety taste. Its extraordinary bouquet makes Marco Polo the most legendary of flavoured teas.

260 Tasting Notes

Yesterday’s sprinkles gave way to real rain. You can just feel the tired old earth around me go “ahhhhhh.”

I woke up craving this. I must have needed an “ahhhh” too. This is lovely and fruity (love that strawberry thing) on its own, but I splashed in a little milk to see what would happen. Not much, but it’s excellent either way.

I’m thinking that if I had to make a list of “you-gotta-try-it” for tea newbies, this would definitely be on it.

I have it ready to mail tomorrow! Yes, Tin Roof Teas is in Raleigh. Anna’s is raspberry yogurt black and soooo tasty. It reminds me of Marco Polo. Then I had their Strawberry Vanilla Green tea and swooooned. I put both in your envelope!

SIPDOWN! I loved this when I first got it, but I did find it to be finicky – finicky, but worth it. As long as I keep the temp around 203F and the time around three minutes this is great.

Hubby and I now prefer Anna’s Blend from Tin Roof Teas, which I think may be sourced from TeaGeschwendner. I has a yogurty tang to it with nice strawberry flavor, but is overall smoother than Marco Polo and is much more forgiving.

This last pot of Marco Polo was really great until I got to the last cup. A tiny bit of very fine sediment had escaped the infuser and that was enough to add a touch of bitterness, or perhaps it just gets bitter as it cools. Either way, the first two cups were fantastic and the last…not so much.

If I added milk and sugar to my teas this might not be a problem, but I prefer my tea sans additions whenever possible.

The tins are lovely! I peeled off the clear label that tells the name of the tea and relabeled this tin with a permanent marker in my fanciest attempt at lovely handwriting so it can now hold my Anna’s Blend!

It’s been forever since I’ve had this tea. But not because I don’t love it. It’s actually the opposite – I adore this tea so much that I haven’t been able to force myself to open the new tin of it. Gotta save it so I don’t run out, right? So it has languished on my shelf for months and months.

But I’ve been wearing my grumpy pants quite a lot lately even though I should be celebrating (since I only have 22 more days of work). So I decide to enforce some celebration in my life by finally opening my tin of this.

Ahhhh! Yes, such a good choice. It’s strawberry shortcake in liquid form (I did use some sugar and half & half this morning, which helps that idea along). Desserty sweet but also fresh-fruity tart (there is some astringency that, combined with the delicious strawberry taste of this tea, reads to my tongue as a light tartness almost exactly like biting into a fresh strawberry). For some reason, I also get the idea of cocoa when drinking this tea. Not so much the taste, but a hint of it in the texture – a richness or sponginess – that just makes it so deliciously dessert-like and happy-making.

And additional bonus is the caffeine. My hands have just a wee bit of a tremor to them this morning thanks to this tea. Which is good because it means that hopefully I won’t be tempted to crawl under my desk for naptime today.

Before I left the house with my tumbler o’ deliciousness, I did a second steep of this to ice. So I quite look forward to seeing how that turns out. Mmmm.

Preparation

Between the fact that this tea is hard to get, and the fact that it sends me back to a world that no longer exists and I always wind up with tears behind my eyes – ooof- yeah – I can’t be without this tea, yet I don’t drink it very often.

Auggy – I’ve got a pretty good line on it most of the time. I’ve got a local Dean and Deluca. If you want, next time you run out let me know and I can run down and see if there’s any there. We can do some sort of swap if you’d like.

Yay – thanks to both wombatgirl & sophistre! takgoti was my buyer last time – I am jealous of those with local MF hook ups! :) And OMG at the lovelies at Market Hall Foods……. Do they ever have any of the more special teas (like Opium Hill)?
thewaterbird, It’s gooooooood. :)

This is great, I hadn’t seen the list! I think Chandernagor or Marco Polo might be my first choice? Btw their spice loaf is wonderful…..gingerbread cakey……perfect with tea…..probably only around during the holidays tho……

SIPDOWN! This is the last of my sample from momo – it will be missed, but not for long as I definitely will be getting more of this one! Like last time, it is all strawberries and cream. I had a touch more leaf than I wanted to use for 12 oz., but there wasn’t any bitterness despite the extra tea… yay!

I’ve had both Strawberry Zabaglione by 52Teas, and Strawberry shortcake by DAVIDsTea, and both of those are similar in taste profile to this, but this edges both of those out on three points. One, it’s actually available for me to buy again. Two, it was consistently good both times I had it – both other teas seemed to be touch and go, sometimes when the parameters didn’t even change. Three, it has a good resteep where the others did not. Definite must buy!

And now for something only marginally related to tea:

There are so many things I’m happy about right now that I think I’ll list them:

1.) Payday
2.) 4 days off – all on a weekend, no less!
3.) It’s raining.
4.) My tea station has wheels!!!

That last one is especially awesome, and I really need to be extra nice to the boyfriend for it. I didn’t think I would particularly NEED the luxury of just moving my entire collection/set up into another room but it is REALLY awesome to just sit it near the couch and lazily reach over for refills.

Aside from a quick grocery store run and some laundry, this is probably what my day will look like: couch, books, Steepster, and bathroom. One more day until Taurus starts – I can’t think of a better way to welcome it!

You had posted this a little while back…i totally went to ikea and picked up 3 solid doors to hide my stash behind since my tea is also in an expedit bookcase. :) However mine lives in a 2×3 lol someday i’ll condense it down to 2X2

the first tea cupboard looking picture is how it’s all stored, i just left the 3 doors open so you can see behind them. the two next pictures is 98% of all the tea in my house on the table, had to go int two shots lol my tea takes up 5 cubes.

ahhhhh now THIS is what I remember! my terrible marco polo experience from last time has now been banished from memory and replaced by this delicious tea sensation.
Fruity, floral, black tea. Mmmmm.
My only regret is that I played with the steep time and cut it down to 4 min. In contradiction to my tea-loving past, I like the flavours to come out strong. I like it best just before it starts to get bitter which can be a little difficult to time.
There was a day when I loved “weak” tea. Funny, I never thought I would see the day where I would evolve to enjoy it so!

This is the cafe that sells MF in Toronto (two locations): http://www.balzacscoffee.com/. I was told they don’t order stock frequently so what they have’ll depend on when you go, but they seem pretty helpful and if you call ahead they’d be able to tell you what’s in stock. They have Marco Polo and the vanilla rooibos as well as a few others to go, so I assume those would be the options to buy.

I was at Sherway Gardens today and checked out their Williams-Sonoma. They did indeed have this tea…for $32. I promptly put it back on the shelf XD. They also had some Harney & Sons (English Breakfast and Paris) but they were marked up considerably as well. The Blue Banana in Kensington has a bigger selection of H&S teas for better prices.

OH MY! Did you that Harney sachet tins are only 10.95 at Barnes and Noble but are $16.95 at Williams-Sonoma for the SAMETIN? I have only purchased Mariages Freres at Southern Season so I have no idea how much it costs at WS in the USA.

Yeah, that’s the general feeling I get from W-S. “Oh, hey, our stuff might look a bit nicer than the stuff from Wal-Mart or Sears, it works the same, but we’re gonna jack up the price anyway.” Designer kitchen stores make me sad…thank goodness I live five minutes away from IKEA!

I am pretty sure we paid about $22 for a tin of their Vanille des Iles, which is why we switched to Harney and Sons Vanilla Black! Much cheaper, and tastes as good to me! I think I paid about the same for Marco Polo.

The MF tins are 3 1/2 oz or 100 grams, so that is a bit pricey! I think we pay about $24 for one pound of Harney Vanilla Black, so it is quite a savings! But there are one or two special teas I don’t mind paying a bit for, especially if they resteep well.

With 1 teaspoon of sugar and a splash of half and half, this tea tastes exactly like the incredible strawberry shortcake baked at Isgro Pasticceria in the Italian Market area of Philadelphia. Juicy perfectly ripe strawberries, moist barely sweet cake redolent of good vanilla, and fresh whipped cream. I had this cake every year for my birthday my entire childhood. This tea is moving me to tears.

The flavor is incredibly delicate and not artificial in the least. It’s an absolute work of art as far as I’m concerned. I never want to be without it, and it was worth every penny.

EDIT: decided to resteep – very pleasant strawberry taste but the cake and whipped cream and tea are gone. Tastes too sweet. The next time I make this tea, I might resteep then drink the resteep without cream and sugar.

I was tempted to have this earlier today but I went with Rishi’s china breakfast instead. I was going to have it with some sugar n milk, but then I was like wait would it get too sweet? Now I’m going to try it next time =P

I thought about drinking a sweet flavored tea to curb the urge to completely blow it and dig around in the cupboard for my hidden small stash of Godiva Chocolate Gems. However, I knew that if I found them I would eat them all!

What to do?

I remembered the Sour Cherry Jam in the frig that I opened for my grandson to have in his Russian Tea recently.
Aha!
A few tablespoons would be a tasty dessert at the bottom of my teacup.

The next step was picking the right tea.
Russian tea would have been the logical selection. Being the Bonnie that I am, I passed by that suggestion and soon remembered that I had some Marco Polo out intended for the morning. That tea and the jam would go well together.

I prepared the teapot: Poured the tea…
The Marco Polo Tea was fruity but floral and a little smoky. This combination was perfect with my Sour Cherry Jam melting at the bottom of the cup…swirled with my spoon, scooped up into my mouth bit by yummy bit. I drank 2 mugs of this sweet jammy tea, slurping and swirling and gnoshing the scoops of cherry bits.

When this tea works, it works SO WELL. When it doesn’t, it’s bitter and undrinkable. Because of that, I’d never buy any, but because Sil gave it to me, I am enjoying a cup now, and have enough for one cup later on. Today it’s almost perfect. I’m getting jammy strawberries and other warm fruits, and it’s only slightly bitter. I count that as a win.